<div><em>Samsung’s Note sees another evolutionary upgrade, losing a few features but gaining so much more, writes <strong>Mala Bhargava</strong></em></div><div> </div><div>For the past five years I’ve reviewed Samsung’s Galaxy Note, from its birth to its recently launched fifth avatar. And I begin with the disclosure that I’m a Note user, upgrading each time to the new version. This time as well, I would like to, were it not for the fact that my Note 4 is working just fine. But here’s why I’m tempted…</div><div> </div><div>The Note 5 has completely left behind the design of previous versions. It’s most compelling in its silver and gold models and made of glass, front and back, with metal framing to hold its thin body together.</div><div> </div><div>From being soundly criticized for its designs, Samsung has moved to bringing out a phone that you’ll hate to put into a case, hiding the smart and attractive looks. The Samsung logo is etched into the back, which this time, isn’t removable. You can’t swap the battery – and I have three batteries for my Note 4, just because I like it that way.</div><div> </div><div>You also don’t get a memory card slot. There’s been some disappointment over that but having lived with both Notes for some weeks, I don’t find I miss either the battery or the memory card on the Note 5. This is because the battery lasts nice and long, through the whole day even with heavy use, though you’ll have to use it very lightly to go through a significant part of the next day. As for the memory card, I realised that the storage on my Note 4 stilll had about 11GB free for use despite my using about 300 apps. But if you plan to carry a big chunk of your music or photos and videos around, you’ll need to resort to online storage and use precious bandwidth to upload these. The Note 5 takes 4K video that can take up a lot of space as can images from its excellent camera, specially if they are saved in RAW format. You also lose the infrared, but I doubt anyone is going to miss that very much.</div><div> </div><div>The Note is of course the smartphone that brought the stylus back and in the Note 5, the S-Pen is really smooth and even more precise. This time, you can pull out the S-Pen and write something, such as a phone number, on the darkened sleeping screen and the note will save itself.</div><div> </div><div>You probably won’t need that all the time, but it’s still a great convenience. The pen now comes out with a little push and a click which is very natural though I miss the shhikkk sound it makes on the Note 4 when it’s tucked back. Talking about tucking the stylus back, you can’t afford to put it in the wrong way round because it can</div><div>damage the device and get stuck though I have already seen solutions to this problem online. Over several weeks however, I never once found myself being about to put the pen in the wrong way – it becomes second nature not to.</div><div> </div><div><table align="right" border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="2" style="width: 300px"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="color:#ff0000;"><strong>Note Facts</strong></span></td></tr><tr><td><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• Stylus “S-Pen” with new sleeping screen writing</strong></span></div><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• 5.7 1440x2560 (~518ppi density) SAMOLED display</strong></span></div><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• 1.5GHz octa core Exynos 7420 processorwith 4GB RAM</strong></span></div><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• 16MP and 5MP cameras with f1.9 aperture, 4K video and YouTube direct broadcast</strong></span></div><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• 32GB internal storage; no external memory card</strong></span></div><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• 3,000mAh battery with quick charging and optional wireless charging</strong></span></div><div><span style="color:#0000cd;"><strong>• Price Rs 53,900</strong></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table>The Note 5 has so many features that it would take far more than the space available to go through these – it always has. One of its standout features is a fabulous crisp screen, possibly the best around in fact. Brightness even in sunlight, vivid colours and viewing angles are not to be faulted. The screen more than does justice to the best-in-class camera which is the same one as on the Galaxy S6, S6 Edge, and S6 Edge+.</div><div> </div><div>The camera is a deal breaker on the Note 5, when combined with all its other functionality, specially the stylus. Two quick presses of the home button bring the camera up so that you can actually take a shot pretty quickly. The shutter speed is also great and the burst mode is a marvel. Just long press to take a machine-gun volley of shots and when you look through them, you’ll find the ones you want to keep. I have had occasional trouble with that burst mode though, when I found it went into an angry non-stop shooting mode and crashed the camera.</div><div> </div><div>But apart from that, the camera takes fabulously detailed shots. In low light, images are not bad either and the noise has bee kept down significantly. There are several shooting modes with Selective Focus, which results in nice depth of field and bokeh, and the Pro mode being the most useful for those who love photography. The Note 5, like its cousins, shoots excellent stablised video, including 4K. I gave in a video to my video department surprising them greatly with the quality.</div><div>The Note 5 is one of the most powerful smartphones around runs Samsung’s famous TouchWiz on top of Android Lollipop, upgradeable to Marshmallow soon. The software has been improved over its previous versions and is “lighter” and easier to use instead of being clunky and intimidatingly feature-filed.</div><div> </div><div>Note fans will find that their Note 4s are still powerful devices with an upgrade to Note 5 not being imperative but may be tempted by the improvement in the camera, writing experience, and the beautiful looks of the device. There’s also the quick charging that works really well, and optional wireless charging. Anyone using earlier versions or thinking of buying a top-end Android phone shouldn’t gloss past what is Samsung’s best phone so far.</div><div> </div><div> </div>
